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Wanstead Bert 8:29 Sat Jan 6
Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

Worth a read for Kompany’s intelligent insight and the conclusion (I’ve posted the extract to save you lazy fuckers the bother of reading the whole thing). Doubt the dildo brothers and her ladyship will be of the same opinion.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/empty-seats-are-no-reflection-on-manchester-city-6zwb383ls

A thought occurred yesterday, though, while listening to City’s thoughtful and highly articulate captain Vincent Kompany on BBC Radio 5 Live, urging Premier League clubs to lower ticket prices in order to improve atmosphere. Drawing on conclusions arrived at while earning his MBA from Manchester Business School, Kompany suggested that clubs should focus not on maximising revenue but on maximising the appeal of their product by filling their stadiums with “the people in the right place”. These, he said, are “probably not always the guys who can afford it”, but “those that live for the club and are probably more attached to it than anyone else”.

Kompany is right, but most leading Premier League clubs have gone so far in pursuit of a more affluent fanbase that there seems no going back. City are in a unique position among English football’s modern heavyweights — and not just because their ownership model leaves them far less reliant on matchday revenue. As other clubs continue to change the demographic of their home crowd, seemingly at the expense of atmosphere, City keep prices lower in order to make sure there are bums on seats. They have an opportunity to be that rare thing: an elite club that retains a distinctly local feel. That may not suit their owners’ global version, but would be something worth treasuring. Whatever the jibes about empty seats every now and then, that would be a great selling point.

BRANDED 12:11 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

So. This is true in most stadia in th top two leagues. When you judge changes you need to judge every change. Wages, competing entertainment, women and children's position in society, tv, entertainment, internationalisation of the league, foreign involvement, security management of games, the approach to violence and violent supporters, the average age of supporters, all seated stadia. I'm sure there are many more. When you take all of them into account you might find key reasons why fans are boring cunts now days.

Mex Martillo 11:22 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

I think after the Financial Fair Play rules, we should have Fair viewing rules that cap prices for tickets and TV packages.

I also think there should be loyalty discounts the more years you hold and attend with a season ticket the cheaper it gets. People passing 50 years should get free season tickets! Plus discounts for youngsters to get them started.

ornchurch ammer 2:28 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

That should be of course mongs not monks.

ornchurch ammer 2:27 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

We are being increasingly told, mainly by monks like Jason Cundy on TalkSport, that the revenue from gate receipts is becoming more and more irrelevant as the amount of revenue from tf and other outside sources is increasing.

If that is true, and I can understand that we won't get anything for nothing, why not charge nominal prices, like £5 for an away ticket or £100 for a home season ticket??

gph 2:02 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

I can't understand why anyone would deprive someone of something they feel passionate about, when they don't.

A couple of times I've had the opportunity to take a York City fan's seat to watch a high-profile Cup game (not through affluence, but through connections) and turned it down.

It's their thing, and I'm happy for them to have it. Even though I missed them do over Man U.

Ronald_antly 1:06 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

I was affluent for a while, but it eased off when I stopped eating baked beans.

eastend joker 1:03 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

we payed �30 for that ,it would have been easy to give us another 3/4 thousand tickets we know we would have sold them , but a mix of the old bill and Spurs prefering to take �50/�60 of their own fans put pay to that , i know they are two bob deluded cunts BUT it's TV that's killing it not them .

chim chim cha boo 12:47 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

eastend joker 12:29 Sun Jan 7

Absolute bollocks. Those spurs fans have just all got the hump that they've got turned over at Wembley so many times this season and use that as an excuse to not bother on a cold night.

Believe me, there are no activists voting with their feet at that club. They STAMP their feet at teams having the temerity to turn up and not roll over for them but no voting with them.

Two-bob cunts.

eastend joker 12:29 Sun Jan 7
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

im no fan of Spurs but that game the other night started as a sat 3.00pm game then got shifted to new years eve and finally stuck on a thurs night for the god of tv ,they wanted top dollar money for tickets and in the end a vast amount of Spurs fans who already have the hump with going to Wembley have just said "poke it " can't say i blame them ,pay television is the god now and as much as football says it craves a "live audience" they are doing fuck all to help real fans .

Mike Oxsaw 10:08 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

chim chim cha boo 9:39 Sat Jan 6

That's true enough - but civil servants have to be managed. They have got to be seen as coming up with the idea or else it's as good as dead in the water - that's just the way they are.

Club owners (but definitely not the fans, that's going too far down the food chain) can quietly and informally suggest that the government take another look, but the administration can never be seen to be told what to do.

charlie paynter 10:00 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

Perhaps the likes of Kompany (£120,000 per week basic salary) would volunteer to lower their wage demands to help facilitate the drop in ticket prices?

Made me laugh a few years back too when Roy Keane was having a go at the prawn sandwich brigade, while demanding his 'market value' of £50,000 a week.

chim chim cha boo 9:39 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

It would be pretty simple to bypass admitting they were wrong about terracing (I'm guessing most who made that decision are dead now anyway it was so long ago) and they could just say that times and football have changed and a return to safe terracing should be given a new go.

Mike Oxsaw 9:01 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

The return of terracing IS probably the answer - if not the full answer, then probably the one that will start the ball rolling and get the atmosphere back again.

But that would mean the civil servants and governments publicly admitting they were (so) wrong on the all-seater requirement. That will NEVER happen, even if they ARE wrong.

Hermit Road 8:52 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

Kids don’t. Young men do. Anyone over the age of 12 was supposed to be) paying adult prices to stand on the terrace in the 80s. Now they get in cheap.

The atmosphere was made by people congregating together, terracing allows that, allocated seating doesn’t. It’s why it took years for there to be a semblance of atmosphere to return to UP after all-seating, and why it will take the sa,e for it to return now. In my view that is.

DocMarten 8:52 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

What our lot want, is a family of four on days trip to Stratford, who on the whim, decide to take in a game. They venture into the club shop, buying two shirts for the kids and a program. They then take their seat, watching the game. Every now and then they may give a restrained cheer. It looks good on TV(nice family in the crowd promoting the ‘niceness’ of the club and the experience) and the club earn a few quid.

What they don’t want, is the single male who bypasses all revenue earning offerings from the club. He takes his seat, normally with others of the same, and vocally supports the team. His support is laced with profanity and frustration(its West Ham after all!). He leaves, again bypassing the revenue earning sections of the ground. From time to time, he gets in a little altercation with the boys in blue.

Worryingly to the owners of the club, the second type of fan, puts off the first.

Just my pennies worth.

chim chim cha boo 8:47 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

Kids don't make the atmosphere though, do they? As much as I liked Kids For A Quid at UP (and as much as I see kids as the future support) they do get a bit screechy.

Personally I'd like to see a family stand at the LS so they could all fuck off and sit in it. I do get a bit sick of sitting on my hands and not giving it out to the ref as he makes mistake after mistake because in the back of my mind I know there are sprogs all dotted around where I sit.

Hermit Road 8:39 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

I think he’s arrived at the wrong conclusion. Terracing is the answer. The day we went from terracing to seating it was like a switch was flicked and the atmosphere disappeared.

In terms of kids tickets, it is cheaper now than it was in the 80s

chim chim cha boo 8:39 Sat Jan 6
Re: Empty seats and affluent fans - The Times

One of the things that boils our supporters' collective piss is that we were told we needed to move stadiums to 'compete at the next level' then when it comes to buying players that fucking gimp Sullivan has the balls to say that the added crowd capacity 'only make another twelve million a season which doesn't even buy you a very good player'.

If you think twelve million pounds is inconsequential lower ticket prices you fucking mong and at least let more proper working-class West Ham fans afford the odd game.